Here is a look at the best and worst progression of players 'playing to their seeds' in GS events in the open era. This covers 176 GS main draws. I have checked the forum and not seen something similar, so if I missed something, please let me know. And I apologize for any mistakes or typos, there are some fairly long lists that are quite similar and easy to mess up at times.

For this, I assume in an 'ideal' QF, for example, seeds 1-8 would all be playing.

Final (ideal: #1 v. #2)

Most:
2 - 40 times (8 AO, 7 RG, 13 W, 12 USO)

In the Open era, the longest streak of #1 v. #2 finals is at Wimbledon, where Federer twice faced Roddick and thrice Nadal.

Least:
0 - 56 times (12 AO, 23 RG, 9 W, 12 USO)

In the period between 1988 and 2005, the #1 and #2 seed both failed to make the RG final 15 times out of 18.

[left]In a crazy coincidence, the 83 and 84 RG share the record, and also appear in the semifinals listed above, but for different reasons: in 83, none of the top 4 seeds made the semis, and in 84 all 4 did. The 83 tournament's 4 losses from the top 4 seeds in the QF round is the only time this happened in the Open Era.
/LEFT]

It's an interesting read for all of those claiming "there was more competition" "era of mugs" etc in one time or another.

But when did seeding start in GS and for what number? Would be interesting to know. Or am I mistaken and it has always been the same? (don't think so)

Ah, thanks for bringing that up, it probably should have been mentioned. I'm not sure on the start off-hand, I only have open era data at easy grasp, but there have been seeding changes.

Since 2001, of course, all GSs have had 32 seeds, up from 16, but that obviously doesn't matter for this post. Since 1977 all GSs were 16 seed affairs.

There are a few pre-1977 Open Era exceptions to the 16 seed rule, at least according to ATP results:

1975 AO had no seeds, and was only a 32-player draw.
1976 and January 1977 had just two seeds each.

Wimbledon had 8 seeds from 1971 until 1973. Before this, it had 16, at least during the Open Era, and it actually had 12 in 1974 before returning to 16 (though I'm not 100% this 12 may not be an error)

The 1971 US Open also had just 8 seeds. All Open Era RGs have had 16 seeds.

This is the recent history of seeding as the ATP draws present them, perhaps someone with more historical knowledge than I can fill in prior history

This year's RG ties the record for most seeded players in the Round of 16, with 15/16 seeded. However, just 12 of these players are top 16 seeds, which leaves it short of the overall record of 14, and the RG record of 13.

With two top 8 seeds (Simon and Djokovic) out before the R16 starts, 2009 RG will not threaten any of the other records (expect with another #1-#2 final as a possibility).

Based on a point that came up in a GM post, here's a similar look, but at all seeded players, rather than just the 'ideal' seeds. Obviously, these lists are heavily dependent on the 32 seed change, with recent years tending to feature more prominently.

Final

Of the eligible GS finals I am considering, just 29 had an unseeded player in the final. Only one, '96 Wimbledon, did not have a top 16 seed. Just 6 unseeded players have won a modern-era GS: 1982 RG (Wilander), 1985 W (Becker), 1994 USO (Agassi), 1997 RG (Kuerten), 2001 W (Ivanisevic), 2004 RG (Gaudio).

Semifinals

Most:
4 - 80 times (17 AO, 19 RG, 18 W, 26 USO)

Note that 7 of the AO occurrences happened with draws smaller than 128.

This is heavily biased towards 32 seed events, but the 'best' performance still comes in the 84 RG, which got 8 of the top 9 through. Also, the 70 AO and 68 USO weren't 128-entry events, so somewhat less impressive.

After two tournaments that saw 12 of the top 16 seeds through to the fourth round, this year's Wimbledon is quite a bit lower, only 7 top 16 seeds moved through. This is one more than last year's Wimby, and below average for all GSs.

The presence of 3 unseeded players (Hewitt, Ferrero and Sela) leaves this year's event one short of the Wimbledon record for seeds in the round of 16.

In the end, Wimbledon was pretty dull from a seeding perspective, making no inroads on the leaderboards. However, I did find an embarrassing oversight in my database; the 2001 AO was totally ignored. This event had none of the top 4 seeds make the semifinals, expanding that list to 14 tournaments.

Nice thread. A lot of people are expecting the upcoming USO to have something like this after what happened in Montreal. Certainly the top 4 plus Roddick and JMDP are heavily favoured to reach the last 8.

__________________ Champions deserve whatever they win playing within the laws of the game

This year's USO tied the all-time record with 14 of the top 16 seeds making the R16, and broke the previous USO record of 13. Having 15 seeded players also tied that overall record, again breaking the previous USO record of 13.

This was also the 14th time that a tournament had all seeded quarterfinalists. 2009 is the first time that three of the four GS tournaments had all seeds in the quarters.